“They didn’t want Indians in that neighborhood. They didn’t want a health authority. ‘Indians leave dirty diapers and trash in the parking lot, and there’s no way we want them in our neighborhood.’ You look at our facility today, and you won’t find anything in Tulsa any prettier or any cleaner or more well-kept.”

– Carmelita Skeeter, CEO of the Indian Health Care Resource Center, describing the opposition her agency faced 16 years ago when it announced its plan to open in the Pearl District. Iron Gate, a soup kitchen and food pantry, is encountering similar opposition to its plans to relocate to the neighborhood. (Source)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Carly Putnam joined OK Policy in 2013. As Policy Director, she supervises policy research and strategy. She previously worked as an OK Policy intern, and she was OK Policy's health care policy analyst through July 2020. She graduated from the University of Tulsa in 2013. As a student, she was a participant in the National Education for Women (N.E.W.) Leadership Institute and interned with Planned Parenthood. Carly is a graduate of the Oklahoma Center for Nonprofits Nonprofit Management Certification; the Oklahoma Developmental Disabilities Council’s Partners in Policymaking; The Mine, a social entrepreneurship fellowship in Tulsa; and Leadership Tulsa Class 62. She currently serves on the boards of Restore Hope Ministries and The Arc of Oklahoma. In her free time, she enjoys reading, cooking, and doing battle with her hundred year-old house.

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